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Effective Charts and Dashboards for Excel users

Archive for the Theory Category

Data Visualization Hierarchy of Needs

Data Visualization Hierarchy of Needs

Is it possible to create a “data visualization hierarchy of needs” like Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs? I’ve tried that in the pyramid above. Here are the details: Is it the right Medium? A chart can really help processing data and minimize information overload, but what about

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Excel Game Changers

You can learn a lot from an expert, but a game changer challenges your believes and assumptions and, at some point, that’s exactly what you need to move forward. Creative destruction. I love it. Let me tell you about three of my personal Excel game changers. Jon

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Alphabetical Sorting Must Die

If you follow Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox, you know I’m shamelessly stealing this post title from him. He says that most of the time a list is sorted alphabetically because a) it’s easier to find a name and b) designers are lazy and don’t want to bother finding

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Data Visualization, Ikea style

Data Visualization, Ikea style

Seven years ago, my wife and I drove 400 miles to the nearest Ikea store and bought furniture for the entire house. Today we have two stores in our city. Things change. Last week we bought a large, wall-to-wall bookcase and replaced some of the old stuff.

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Memorable Charts? Forget About It!

This too much discussed paper “found that people’s accuracy in describing the embellished charts was no worse than for plain charts, and that their recall after a two-to-three week gap was significantly better. In addition, participants preferred the embellished charts“. OK, let’s take a deep breath. Apparently,

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No, Tufte’s Charts Are not Plain and Simple

A new data visualization research paper finds that chart junk does not harm accuracy and actually improves recall. The paper is an interesting read but, unfortunately, not for the right reasons. I’ll discuss the paper in an upcoming post. Today I just want to comment a sentence

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Don’t Try to Be Funny (Grumpy Old Man’s Guide to Making Charts)

Did you know that turkey consumption soared after the launch of Microsoft Windows 1.0? And did you know that this growth trajectory lasted until Windows 3.0? Coincidence? I don’t think so… I find this amusing. Sorry. By the way, don’t try to be funny when making charts.

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Charts Are for Sissies (Grumpy Old Man’s Guide to Charts)

Making a chart is so simple that even a chimpanzee can be trained to do it – press F11 and get the banana (that would explain the poor quality of many business charts and presentations – and the raising banana consumption). To prove that they are better

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Help me Find International Data Visualization Blogs

We all love Edward Tufte (perhaps too much), but if you want a more consistent and articulate data visualization theory you must read the French cartographer Jacques Bertin. And did you know that one of the best (and remarkably unknown) data visualization experts is Rolf Hichert, from Germany?

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Don't Try to Be Memorable (Grumpy Old Man's Guide to Making Charts)

I often read that you should make your charts “memorable”. Well, I’m not sure if this is a good advice, specially when people use “memorable” and “professional-looking” in the same sentence. It’s OK if you are a graphic designer and you want to spend some time crafting

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